Bookmarkable URLThis magnificent twelve-light chandelier, like a smaller nine-light chandelier which is also now in the Wallace Collection (F84), was made by Caffiéri, probably assisted by his elder son Philippe Caffiéri (1714-74). It was almost certainly given by Louis XV to his eldest daughter, Louise-Elisabeth, Duchess of Parma, during one of her visits to Paris in the 1750s. In 1803 it was hanging in the Gran Salone of the Duchess’s former Palace of Colorno. With its flowing S-curved arms the chandelier is a prime example of the Rococo style in gilt bronze. The platform at the bottom of the cage bears the engraved mark of Caffiéri and the date 1751.

Bookmarkable URLThis nine-light gilt-bronze chandelier (F84) by Jacques Caffiéri (1678-1755), which is displayed in the Front State Room of the Wallace Collection, was acquired by Wallace in Paris in November 1871, along with the twelve-light chandelier (F83), which hangs next door in the Back State Room. Both chandeliers are signed by Caffiéri. Both previously hung in the palace of Colorno, north of Parma, and are believed to have been given by Louis XV to his eldest daughter, Louise-Elisabeth (1727-59), who had married Don Felipe, younger son of Philip V of Spain, in 1739. In 1748 Louis XV obtained, for his daughter and son-in-law, the duchy of Parma in Northern Italy and it was probably to furnish their palaces in Parma and Colorno that he gave them the chandeliers. Madame Infante, as his daughter was known, made three trips to Paris after her marriage and is known to have taken back to Parma a large quantity of coaches and wagons filled with furniture and other objects, some of which may have been owned by Louis XV. The chandelier has drip-pans cast as sunflowers on the ends of its arms; the same motif appears on the central branches of a set of four gilt-bronze wall-lights in the J. Paul Getty Museum, which also bear nineteenth-century inventory numbers from the palace of Colorno. The wall-lights and the nine-light chandelier may, in the lifetime of Louise-Elisabeth, have furnished the same room.

Bookmarkable URLAn important element of fireplace furniture in the 18th century was a pair of and irons or firedogs (iron bars that supported the logs), and along with other aspects of interior decoration these assumed a more obviously decorative function. Highly sculpted and ornamented fronts were added, cast in brass and richly gilded, which reflected the artistic style of the moment. On this pair (with F280), two naked infants represent Literature and Sculpture, identifiable from the attributes of a book and a mallet which they hold and, along with the two globes, suggest the erudition of their owner that would have been most appropriate for the Age of Enlightenment. The same model of infants had also been used on a pair of wall-lights made 20 years earlier by Jacques Caffiéri (1678-1755) and on other firedogs in the rococo style dating from the middle of the century, presumed also to have been by Caffiéri. We know that he left various master models after his death, including some of children, and it is assumed that his son Philippe utilized his father’s models here in an updated design that incorporated more fashionable, neo-classical motifs.

Bookmarkable URLAn important element of fireplace furniture in the 18th century was a pair of andirons or firedogs (iron bars that supported the logs), and along with other aspects of interior decoration these assumed a more obviously decorative function. Highly sculpted and ornamented fronts were added, cast in brass and richly gilded, which reflected the artistic style of the moment. On this pair (with F279), two naked infants represent Literature and Sculpture, identifiable from the attributes of a book and a mallet which they hold and, along with the two globes, suggest the erudition of their owner that would have been most appropriate for the Age of Enlightenment. The same model of infants had also been used on a pair of wall-lights made 20 years earlier by Jacques Caffiéri (1678-1755) and on other firedogs in the rococo style dating from the middle of the century, presumed also to have been by Caffiéri. We know that he left various master models after his death, including some of children, and it is assumed that his son Philippe utilized his father’s models here in an updated design that incorporated more fashionable, neo-classical motifs.

Bookmarkable URLWeight-driven clock with a case of oak veneered with ebony. The heavy gilt-bronze mounts are typical of the early neo-classical style. The clock has a compensating pendulum made of brass and steel rods.

Bookmarkable URLThe gilt-bronze group on the top of this clock shows Apollo in his chariot, whipping his horses into action to gallop across the sky, an illustration of a scene from Ovid’s Metamorphoses. This motif is a particularly appropriate embellishment for a clock as Apollo was the sun god who rose every morning to bring the day. A similar scene is also referred to in a painting by Boucher in the Wallace Collection (P485). The clock has a pendulum made up of five steel and four brass rods, which allow it to compensate for changes in atmospheric conditions.